1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a device and system for identifying animal bodies, and more particularly relates to a device and system for identifying bodies employing, for example, data for irises of eyes showing body characteristics necessary in the management of bodies of animals such as horses and cattle.
2. Description of the Related Art
Racehorse body identification occurring at horse racecourses, auction houses and breeding stock farms has conventionally mainly been carried out based on pedigree certificate supervisory facilities. Methods using hair color, leg marking characteristics, head flashes, hair curl and blood type are currently used throughout the world as methods for identifying horses at racecourses. The use of brand-irons and tattoos then makes these methods complete. However, when carrying out identification using hair color, leg marking characteristics, head flashes and hair curl, there are a lot of horses that have few characteristics or that have the same characteristics and the specifying of a horse is therefore often incomplete. Further, in addition to the erasure and falsification of the brand-irons and tattoos, there is also the problem of the pain and localized festering the animal receives, with improvements also being desirable from the point of view of the welfare of the animals. Moreover, identifying bodies using the blood type is accurate, but not only does this process take a long time until a decision is made, it is also expensive.
In the case of body identification of cattle, methods using identification, nameplates such as neck rings and ear tags, brand-irons and tattoos etc. are carried out. However, there is also the danger of the identification nameplate becoming damaged, lost or stolen, as well as the same problems with identifications using brand-irons or tattoos as encountered in the identification of horses. In particular, in the case of falsification, even if it is apparent that a falsification has been made, it is difficult to verify where the original belongs.
In recent years, identifying technology utilizing microchips (hereinafter abbreviated to MC) has become prominent as a method of identifying animal bodies (For example, refer (in particular) to The Japan Racing Association racehorse general research institute issue of "horse studies" Vol. 25(9) page 318 to 329). Here, there is a method where a chip built into a micro-integrated circuit enclosed in a glass tube is embedded into the living body of an animal using a syringe, etc., the area at which the circuit is embedded is looked into using a non-contact sensor and an output signal is then taken as body identifying information.
However, identifying methods employing MCs have a large number of problems concerning the operativity of the embedding in the animal, localized reactions such as pain, swelling, aches and festering inflicted on the horse at the time of embedding, hindrance to the movement of the horse, along with clinical disorders, movement of the MC within the horse body, operativity of the sensor, changes and instability in the sensitivity of the sensor, and reliability etc. As there is a great deal of resistance from people concerned with animals to the adoption of MC methods from the point of view of the welfare of the animals, it would be preferable if an identifying method could be found to replace MC identifying methods.
In MC identification methods, there is the possibility that a registration microchip embedded within the living body of the animal will be taken out and embedded into another animal. In the case of this illegal act, there is then the possibility of another animal being mistakenly identified as the correct animal.